This is what Xander and I have been working on for a while...poor guy didn't realize it was gonna be an "up the nose" camera angle. Isn't he the cutest, loosest-lipped, fuzzy-eared goof?

What we're doing: This is a work in progress! We challenged the puppy class a while back to click something that was hard to lure (to get them to stop relying on luring so much!). One of the behaviors was having the dog lick their lips (their OWN lips, not a "kiss a human" trick). So I figured I'd better work on this too...so Xander was the chosen one, as he took to it the best when I gavevall of the dogs a try for a few minutes.

He actually will lick his lips on cue now (I stick my tongue out at him and he licks his chops)...but now I'm trying to get the little tongue flick too...it's much harder than just the licking lips, as I find myself missing little tongue flicks and clicking big licks (though now that I'm seeing it from below...it's easier to see! We're having fun though! I went on a little too long though...because you can definitely see the behavior deteriorate...we'd done a few minutes before this too...to get the camera angle right.

We were training in the bathroom ...(close quarters...few distractions...great for training!)

maberi wrote:Ha, that is awesome Erin!! I would have never thought to teach something like that

I'm working on training Karma to sneeze. I'll have to post some video when I get it down

...Sawyer and I are working on sneeze too...he's funny because now he'll just give a big exhale and look at me...but it's not quite a sneeze...more of a "Hmmph". I've switched to clicking that because it makes me laugh!

"I don't have any idea if my dogs respect me or not, but they're greedy and I have their stuff." -- Patty Ruzzo

"Dogs don't want to control people. They want to control their own lives." --John Bradshaw

I was working on this with Hannah, and she was starting to get it, but she did a lot of other frantic movements along with the lip lick, so I was having trouble isolating it. I've never tried it with Renee. Might be interesting. Next time I'm at my parents' house, I'll try to get some video of Hannah. Maybe you can give me some pointers.

Hundilein wrote:I was working on this with Hannah, and she was starting to get it, but she did a lot of other frantic movements along with the lip lick, so I was having trouble isolating it.

Please do tell us how you end up isolating it. This is the part of shaping I have the most trouble with--if I keep the rate of reinforcement nice and high, my dogs can't tell what exactly I'm reinforcing. If I try to isolate the specific behavior too quickly, they get frustrated. So I usually end up helping out a little, which is probably counterproductive. Here's Vanya head dipping while he's also turning his back legs around a perch, so he starts thinking I'm clicking for the head-dip not the back legs. I help out by walking around him, so stops dipping and scoots his back legs, but I'm not sure he ever realized that it was his back legs that were earning him the c/t:tahttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrR15_UYTD4&feature=youtube_gdata

Hundilein wrote:I was working on this with Hannah, and she was starting to get it, but she did a lot of other frantic movements along with the lip lick, so I was having trouble isolating it.

Please do tell us how you end up isolating it. This is the part of shaping I have the most trouble with--if I keep the rate of reinforcement nice and high, my dogs can't tell what exactly I'm reinforcing. If I try to isolate the specific behavior too quickly, they get frustrated. So I usually end up helping out a little, which is probably counterproductive. Here's Vanya head dipping while he's also turning his back legs around a perch, so he starts thinking I'm clicking for the head-dip not the back legs. I help out by walking around him, so stops dipping and scoots his back legs, but I'm not sure he ever realized that it was his back legs that were earning him the c/t:tahttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrR15_UYTD4&feature=youtube_gdata

I'm never very good at explaining myself...I do things by feel and don't plan well.... Definitely right brain type of shaping. I go with the flow a lot, and just have fun capturing movements.

From watching the video of the perch work...here's what I'd do...I'd first click for standing with two feet on and NO head movements. I'd not worry about the feet at the moment, and just click for standing with no head bobbing. Once he was getting good at that, and was pretty solid at just standing with his head still, I'd click for tiny movements in the back feet...nothing big, just slight shuffling or shifting body weight. If he gives big movements, I'd click for that too...but you're probably not going to get big movements at first. If the head bobs came back, I'd go back to clicking just for a still head.

I hope that made sense!

"I don't have any idea if my dogs respect me or not, but they're greedy and I have their stuff." -- Patty Ruzzo

"Dogs don't want to control people. They want to control their own lives." --John Bradshaw